Composition Project: Themes Remade
Jane Austen's Emma became Amy Heckerling's Clueless, The Wizard of Oz was woven into David Lynch's film Wild At Heart, and Mary Shelley's Frankenstein has been re-invented into Mel Brooks's musical stage comedy Young Frankenstein. Whether the adaptation seems to directly parallel the original work, or whether it is a ridiculous parody, there is much to be said about how the arguments in texts get remade into new media. Sometimes these media resend the original argument. And sometimes, they take on a whole new message, attract new audiences, and make a new kind of cultural splash.
In your project, you branched out beyond the texts we'd read and into popular culture in order to examine the rhetorical (re)construction and sustainability of those themes. In this project, you will build toward the same FWP outcomes, and use your rhetorical skills to construct your own creative rendition of an argument you've found in one of our readings. Would any of the texts for this term make a good sitcom? Board game? Motion simulator ride? Fantasy adventure role-playing game? Movie? Ad campaign? Ballet? Music video? Choose one of the readings from this term and 1) adapt it for a new medium, and 2) compose a rhetorical analysis that explains how and why you have adapted it.
Your Adaptation and its Rhetorical Situation
As you develop your adaptation, keep your vision of the rhetorical situation close by at all times:
• Why have you chosen this text and this argument?
• What old or new argument would you like to make with your adaptation?
• Who would watch/listen to/read that adaptation?
• How do you want to be perceived as its creator?
If you don't have the technical knowledge to realize your big ideas for an adaptation, this limitation shouldn't stop you from sketching it out. Consider how you might "depict" or describe your adaptation in the best way you know how.